Thaindian News

Tehran, Nov 23 (IANS) Iran has no fear of not selling crude oil to Europe, a top Iranian official has said, following reports that France has urged the European Union to boycott Iran’s petroleum as a new step to expand sanctions on Tehran.

France has called on its western partners and the European Union to jointly impose new sanctions on Iran to force it into negotiations on its nuclear issue, Xinhua reported.

Paris regards Tehran’s nuclear programme as an “unacceptable threat” to the region and the whole world, the presidential Elysee Palace has said. It has written a letter to the governments of Germany, Canada, US, Japan and Britain and to the European Council and the European Commission on the issue.

Ahmad Ghalebani, managing director of the National Iranian Oil Company, told IRNA news agency: “Many countries want Iranian crude and we are supplying them with their needed oil, so we are not afraid of not selling it to Europeans.”

He said that, at present, Iran was not selling oil to France and the volume of Iran’s crude exports to the EU member countries was not very significant.